Miss Arizona came by, introduced herself to me. We took pictures and exchanged autographs.

After the autograph session. We had an onstage media session with questions and answers for the media and general public. My hat goes off to the city of Payson, what an awesome event they put on. There were booths, food, kids jumping houses, and more.

The night before the tournament started, we had 2" of rain. There was a huge mudslide in the morning that blocked some anglers from making it to blast off in time. They had to wait for the road to be cleared. The first day was rainy and cloudy all day.

I was totally unprepared, I had no pants, only shorts, tennis shoes, and a jacket. By the end of the day I was drenched all the way through, but lucky enough the weather was warm, it was still 80 degrees. I caught a small limit weighing 6 lbs. I drew Rachael Uribe, she was a great fisherwoman. I learned quickly that I could not tell her when I missed a fish, or she would make the cast and catch the fish. So I kept my mouth shut the rest of the day.

The next day the weather cleared, it was bright and sunny. I drew my good friend JR Wright, whom I've fished with before. He's always a pleasure to fish with, we get along real good, work together and always get our limits. I wound up with 7 lbs 9 ounces moving me up to 40th place.

The 3rd day I fished with Fred Szatkowski, a local angler. Fred was good co-angler and fisherman. We both got our limits and he ended up in 6th on the co-angler side.

It was an uphill battle, starting off slow and working my way up each day. Managing to move into 30th place and cash a check. Making $4,771. I was so happy.

I had a very slow practice and after the 1st day of the tournament, I didn't think I had a chance at a paycheck. But what do you know, a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while. Just enough to keep him alive.